Author: BlackMask Financial

GameStop Corp (NYSE: GME) has been extending its falls on Tuesday and trades at around $48.65 at the time of writing. Shares of the videogaming company that returned to fame due to the frenzy on WallStreetBets – a forum attracting retail traders on Reddit has continued its fall from grace. GME hit a high above $400 at the peak. Shares continue their downtrend despite RobinHood’s removal of restrictions on buying stock during the peak. Politicians on both sides of the aisle have been fiercely critical of RobinHood’s conduct.

TOKYO (Reuters) – Bitcoin extended gains on Tuesday to a record high as the afterglow of Tesla Inc’s investment in the cryptocurrency had investors reckoning it would become a mainstream asset class for both corporates and money managers. Bitcoin has more than doubled over two months as institutional investors search for alternative wealth stores and retail traders ride the wave. Monday’s leap after Tesla’s announcement was its largest daily rise in more than three years. It climbed to a new peak of $48,216 late in the Asian afternoon on Tuesday. Rival cryptocurrency ethereum had struck a record high of $1,784.85 in the early morning. Shares of companies that provide trading platforms for bitcoin and the technology to “mine” the cryptocurrency surged in China, South Korea, and Australia, and big computer chip making companies such as SK Hynix also rose. The U.S. dollar slumped against most currencies. Analysts figuredTesla’s announcement that it had bought $1.5 billion in bitcoin and that it would take the cryptocurrency as payment for cars is part of a larger shift as companies and big investment houses follow small traders into the asset. “While you can now buy a Tesla with bitcoin, I wouldn’t suggest doing so,” said Michael Bucella, partner at crypto investment firm BlockTower on CNBC. “We’re in a position where these are the earliest phases of an allocation to bitcoin from the institutional and corporate community.” Bitcoin is already up 62% this year, on top of a 300% rally last year, as investors search for alternatives to the greenback because of the U.S. Federal Reserve’s 0% interest rates. Central bankers and regulators, particularly in China, are also starting to embrace issuing their own digital currencies for everyday use, in a major break from the conventional workings of global finance. “Digital currencies, it seems clear to us, are going to be an increasing part of financial architecture very broadly and potentially portfolios moving forward,” Ben Powell, APAC chief investment strategist at BlackRock’s Investment Institute, said on CNBC. “There isn’t just news in the U.S. with the bitcoin situation, but in China we’ve got a rollout of China’s digital currency with so-called ‘red packets’.”

LONDON (Reuters) – It is not yet clear whether the world needs a new set of vaccines to fight different variants of the novel coronavirus but scientists are working on new ones so there is no reason for alarm, the head of the Oxford Vaccine Group said on Tuesday. South Africa has paused a planned rollout of AstraZeneca’s vaccines after data showed it gave minimal protection against mild infection among young people from the dominant variant there, stoking fears of a much longer battle with the pathogen.

AstraZeneca and Oxford University aim to produce a next generation of vaccines that will protect against variants as soon as the autumn before the Northern Hemisphere winter, AstraZeneca’s research chief said this month.

“There are definitely new questions about variants that we’re going to be addressing. And one of those is: do we need new vaccines?,” Andrew Pollard, Chief Investigator on the Oxford vaccine trial, told BBC radio. “I think the jury is out on that at the moment, but all developers are preparing new vaccines so if we do need them, we’ll have them available to be able to protect people.” Vaccines are seen as the swiftest path out of the COVID-19 crisis which has killed 2.33 million people and turned normal life upside down for billions. Researchers from the University of Witwatersrand and the University of Oxford said in a prior-to-peer analysis that the AstraZeneca vaccine provided minimal protection against mild or moderate infection from the South African variant among young people. Protection against moderate-severe disease, hospitalisation or death could not be assessed in the study of around 2,000 volunteers who had a median age of 31 as the target population were at such low risk, the researchers said. “I think there’s clearly a risk of confidence in the way that people may perceive you. But as I say I don’t think that there is any reason for alarm today,” Pollard said. “The really important question is about severe disease and we didn’t study that in South Africa, because that wasn’t the point of that study, we were specifically asking questions about young adults.”

Feb 8 (Reuters) – South Africa halted the planned rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University after data showed it gave minimal protection against mild infection from one variant of the virus found in the country.

* The variant was identified in December and is now the dominant variant in South Africa, responsible for 80%-90% of COVID-19 new cases.

* Scientists say it is different from other variants circulating in South Africa because it has multiple mutations in the important “spike” protein that the virus uses to infect human cells.

* The 501Y.V2 variant, part of the B.1.351 lineage, is about 53% more transmissible than earlier variants of the virus, research shows.

* South African scientists say there is no clear evidence that it is associated with more severe disease or worse outcomes. However, it does appear to spread faster than previous iterations.

* As of Jan. 27, it had been identified in 41 countries, according to the World Health Organization. Australia, China France, Japan and Switzerland are among the countries that have found cases.

* Drugmakers including Pfizer/BioNTech , Moderna, AstraZeneca are testing whether their vaccines protect against the variant.

Here is what the trials found:

ASTRAZENECA-OXFORD UNIVERSITY:

In an analysis, which has not been peer reviewed, the shot developed by the British partners provides minimal protection against mild-moderate COVID-19 infection from the B.1.351 coronavirus variant first identified in South Africa. (https://bit.ly/3aPLpSp)

The study was based on 2,026 volunteers who were on average 31 years old – half were given a placebo. Mild disease was defined as at least one symptom of COVID-19. Prior to widespread circulation of the more contagious variant, the vaccine was showing efficacy of around 75%, researchers said. In a later analysis based mostly on infections by the new variant, there was only a 22% lower risk of developing mild-to-moderate COVID-19 versus those given a placebo. Although researchers said the figure was not statistically significant, due to trial design, it is well below the benchmark of at least 50% regulators have set for vaccines to be considered effective against the virus. The study did not assess whether the vaccine helped prevent severe COVID-19 because it involved mostly relatively young adults not considered to be at high risk for serious illness. AstraZeneca said it believed its vaccine could protect against severe disease given that the neutralising antibody activity was equivalent to that of other COVID-19 vaccines that have demonstrated protection against severe disease. The British partners aim to produce a next generation of COVID-19 vaccines that will protect against variants as soon as the autumn.

REACTIONS SO FAR:

* Some scientists say it may be better to roll out the AstraZeneca shot in South Africa to provide some protection rather than waiting for the delivery of other shots.

Andrew Pollard, chief investigator on the Oxford vaccine trial, said the data confirms that the coronavirus will find ways to spread, but shots could help ease the toll on health care systems if they prevent severe disease.

* While it was only a small sample size and in low-risk volunteers, the data highlights the need to determine if the shot is effective in prevent more severe illness, the WHO said on Monday.

Additional studies are needed to confirm the optimal vaccination schedule, it said.

“What these results tell us is that we need to do everything we can to reduce circulation of the virus and delay mutations that may reduce the efficacy of existing vaccines,” it said.

“It also seems increasingly clear that manufacturers will have to adjust to the COVID-19 viral evolution, taking into account the latest variants for future booster shots.”

Emma Hodcroft, a researcher at the University of Bern: “If the vaccine is less effective, there would be a concern that any partial protection it may offer could allow mutations that confer an advantage by evading that immunity to rise to prominence, perhaps leading to variants that are completely escaped from vaccine-immunity.”

PFIZER-BIONTECH:

Preliminary data, which have yet to be peer reviewed and involve a small number of patients, show the vaccine may be less able to protect against infection with the South African variant of the virus.

NOVAVAX AND J&J:

Clinical trial data on COVID-19 vaccines developed by Novavax and Johnson & Johnson have found the South African coronavirus reduced their ability to protect against the disease.

FIVE SECONDS OF GLORY:

No, it wasn’t a glitch — for some Super Bowl viewers, a Reddit commercial really did pop up on the screen.

© From Reddit Reddit’s Superbowl ad aired for about five seconds during the big game on Sunday, February 7, 2021.

The spot, which was just five seconds, opened as if it were a car commercial, but then quickly then flashed to Reddit’s orange and white logo, which was followed by a message. “If you’re reading this, it means our bets paid off,” the message read. “One thing we learned from our communities last week is that underdogs can accomplish just about anything when we come together around a common area.” The spot comes after a Reddit army — from the WallStreetBets page — took on Wall Street pros by inflating the share price of GameStop. The mass buying spree led to huge gains for some in the Reddit crowd who got in early. Hedge funds, meanwhile, lost billions of dollars on their short positions. “Who knows, maybe you’ll be the reason finance textbooks have to add a chapter on ‘tendies,'” the Reddit ad read. “Powerful things happen when people rally around something they really care about. And there’s a place for that. It’s called Reddit.” Reddit said it spent the “entire marketing budget” on the ad, which the company’s Chief Marketing Officer Roxy Young said “was not part of our marketing plan.”

“But we were so inspired by the power of our communities in recent weeks that we rallied to pull it together in just a few short days in collaboration with our agency partners at R/GA,” she told CNN Business in an email statement. “I am really proud of what we were able to achieve with just five seconds and think it beautifully captures the heart of Reddit in our unique and brilliantly absurd tone.” The ad aired in nine of the top 10 US metro markets, Young said, including New York, LA, Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, San Francisco, Philadelphia, Boston and Washington, DC. Nick Note: these assholes are going to make us a shit pot of money. They are bringing in the suckers in mass. New blood… i love it. Soon we will harpoon this whale and eat his flesh. Their Super Bowl spot gives new meaning to flash in the pan.

LONDON (Reuters) – World shares hit a record high on Monday and oil surpassed $60 a barrel for the first time in a year, on hopes that a $1.9 trillion COVID-19 aid package will be passed by U.S. lawmakers as soon as this month. Even news that South Africa had halted the rollout of AstraZeneca’s vaccine after a study showed it gave only limited protection against the country’s more contagious variant of the virus wasn’t going to put equity markets off. MSCI’s 50-country index of world stocks hit its ninth record high of 2021 overnight as Tokyo’s Nikkei jumped on talk of Japan relaxing emergency restrictions [.T] and as China’s markets got busy before the start of the lunar new year. [.SS] Europe then made a strong start as higher oil prices and inflation expectations lifted basic resource and banking shares, and France’s Veolia launched a hostile 11.3 billion-euro takeover bid for waste and water rival Suez.

“A generalised risk-on tone is pushing stocks higher,” UniCredit’s analysts said in a note.

Bond markets were focused on how far inflation might rise if the current mix of stimulus, rising oil and food prices and expectations for a reopening economies continue to hold. Ten-year U.S. Treasury yields, which are one of the main drivers of global borrowing costs, climbed to 1.2%, their highest since the peak of coronavirus uncertainty last March. Break-even rates, which are designed to account for inflation, traded as high as 2.21%, their highest since 2014. “It will be hard not to see inflation in something when we get what is likely to be a short-term stimulus boost,” Deutsche Bank’s Jim Reid said, referring to planned U.S. stimulus. “Whether that will be in goods, wages or asset prices or all three remains to be seen, but it seems inevitable there will be an impact.” Brent crude touched an intraday high of $60.06 a barrel, the highest since January last year. Saudi Arabia’s pledge of extra supply cuts in February and March on the back of reductions by other OPEC members its allies, including Russia, is helping to balance global markets and support prices. In a sign that supplies are tightening, the six-month Brent spread hit its highest in more than year, $2.45. OCBC’s economist Howie Lee said the Saudis had sent another “very bullish signal” last week by keeping its Asian prices unchanged. “I don’t think anybody dares to short the market when Saudi is like this,” he said. Asia’s overnight rally had seen Japan’s Nikkei close up 2%, Chinese blue-chip shares advance 1.3% and Australian shares finish 0.6% higher. Wall Street futures were also pointing higher after the Nasdaq and S&P 500 both climbed to record highs on Friday as weak monthly U.S. jobs data supported expectations of stimulus and after some strong corporate earning.

U.S. President Joe Biden and his Democratic allies in Congress forged ahead with their stimulus plan on Friday as lawmakers approved a budget outline that will allow them to muscle through in the coming weeks without Republican support.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yallen predicted the United States would reach full employment next year if Congress can pass its support package. “That’s a big call, given full employment is 4.1%, but one that will sit well with the market at a time when the vaccination program is being rolled out efficiently in a number of countries,” said Chris Weston, Melbourne-based chief strategist at Pepperstone. Expectations of a U.S. economic recovery have not boosted the dollar, though, “because this shift in prospects is seen by the market as part of a global recovery,” Westpac economists wrote in a note. “Investors therefore favour risk taking, and so value the safety of the U.S. dollar less.” Indeed, the dollar came off a four-month high against the Japanese yen to be last at 105.50. The euro was weaker at $1.2027 after rising 0.7% on Friday to a one-week high. The risk-sensitive Australian dollar eased from a one-week high to $0.7675 while South Africa’s rand fell nearly 0.5% after its vaccine troubles. Nick Note: its off to the races. Ride the wave. Always remember the bigger the wave the bigger the crash. But for now first thing first!

After adjustment for covariates, the habitual use of vitamin D supplements was significantly associated with a 34% lower risk of COVID-19 infection (OR, 0.66; 95% CI, 0.45–0.97; P = 0.034). Circulating vitamin D levels at baseline or genetically predicted vitamin D levels were not associated with the risk of COVID-19 infection. The association between the use of vitamin D supplements and the risk of COVID-19 infection did not vary according to the different levels of circulating or genetically predicted vitamin D (P-interactions = 0.75 and 0.74, respectively). Nick Note: Take the damn Vitamin. I have seen recommendations  of 10,000 IU per day. WITH NO REPORTS OF TOXICITY

READ THE STUDY FOR YOURSELF:

Vitamin D study UK